9th Panzer Division

The 9th Panzer Division was a panzer division of the German Wehrmacht that was active from 3 January 1940 to 8 May 1945 during World War II. The division was originally raised from Austrian forces annexed into Nazi Germany during the Anschluss of 1938, and it was headquartered in Vienna. The division took part in the blitzkrieg attacks into Western Europe and the Soviet Union, and it was badly mauled at the Battle of Kursk in 1943. The division returned to France to rebuild in 1944, and it was rushed to counter Operation Overlord. It was almost completely destroyed escaping the Falaise Gap, during which it was commanded by Max Sperling. It lost two-thirds of its strength during the Siegfried Line campaign, and it was given 11,000 replacements and 178 armored vehicles in September 1944. In November 1944, it fought a bitter six-day battle with the US 2nd Armored Division in the Puffendorf-Immendorf sector, knocking out 76 tanks and inflicting 1,300 casualties while losing 1,100 men and 86 tanks. Following this, the division was sent into the OKW reserve, and it was a part of the central attack during the Battle of the Bulge in December 1945. The division took extreme losses due to Adolf Hitler's refusal to allow for the division to retreat in a timely manner, and its final battle was at Cologne on 6 March 1945. As a part of the battered LXXXI Armeekorps, the corps had divisional strength, and the 9th Panzer Division, the 363rd Volksgrenadier Division, and the 3rd Panzergrenadier Division fought to defend the city from the US 3rd Armored Division. Divisional commander Harald von Elverfeldt was killed, and only a small remnant of the division fled to the Harz Mountains. On 26 April 1945, the German command disbanded the 9th Panzer Division and absorbed its survivors into other units.